Bloody Sunset
by Flybie99
Summary: Rythian sets out to finish what he started. Based off 'Sjin and Duncan are Going to Die'.


'I'm still not sure about this, Rythian.'

Rythian looked up from where he had been sharpening his katana and smiled gently at her.

'Don't worry. I'm not going to actually kill them. I just want to teach them a lesson.'

'I can understand why you want to hurt Lalna, but what did Sjin ever do?' Zoey said, standing up and moving around the table to stand next to Rythian.

'These things must be done,' Rythian said grimly, raising the katana and tilting it to catch the light.

Zoey sighed and picked up her own katana, gazing miserably at her own reflection in the polished metal.

'Oh, come on, Zoey,' Rythian said coaxingly. 'I'll just give them a nip on the arm, nothing more.'

'Alright,' she said, sighing again and sheathing the blade.

Rythian stood up, a look of strange, stifled eagerness on his face.

'Come on,' he said. 'There's work to be done.'

...

'It's quite lovely, don't you think?'

The sun was setting over Sipsco. The golden light filtered through the branches of the trees, illuminating the two figures sitting on the wall facing West. One, a blonde-haired man wearing a lab coat and goggles pushed up his forehead, was tinkering with a piece of machinery in his hands. Every so often he would extract some important part and replace it with something else, his light grey eyes narrowed slightly as he worked.

The other, a man with thick brown hair and an impressive beard and moustache, was gazing happily into the distance, quite unaware that his partner was solely uninterested in his remarks about how pretty the flowers were looking today or how the clouds turned a pleasant yellow colour when they passed in front of the sun.

'I don't get much time to sit like this,' the bearded man said, smiling at the leaves of the trees. 'I have so much work to do at Sipsco. The dirt won't make itself, you know!'

He chuckled and started swinging his legs over the stone brick wall, beaming.

'I suppose you don't get much free time either, do you?' he continued, turning to his companion. 'I mean, you have the lab to look after, right?'

The other appeared not to have heard him, and removed a screw from the object in his hands.

'Lalna?'

The man looked up, shaking his head in a bemused sort of way. 'What? Oh. What is it, Sjin?'

The bearded man, Sjin, repeated: 'I suppose you don't get much free time either, do you? What with the lab to look after and all.'

'Not much,' Lalna replied, returning to the machine.

Sjin beamed again and folded his hands in his lap, still swinging his legs. He squinted into the distance, and frowned a little.

'Who's that?'

'What?' Lalna asked vaguely.

'Those two people walking across the plain. One of them looks like Zoey - I can tell that much from the hair.'

Lalna glanced up sharply. All his absentmindedness seemed to have vanished. He peered across the plain, narrowing his eyes before saying, in a cold, angry voice: 'Rythian.'

'Oh, I forgot,' Sjin said cheerfully, 'you had a disagreement with Rythian. Shall we go out and meet them?'

'No,' Lalna said quickly. 'Don't go near them, Sjin. Stay away.'

'What?' Sjin frowned. 'But they're our frie -'

'They are no friends of mine!' Lalna snapped, pulling Sjin to his feet. 'Get inside the factory. I'll keep them away. Get Sips, and make sure he stays inside too.'

'B-but what's going on?' Sjin said, bewildered. 'I don't -'

'Go, quickly!' Lalna said, glancing over at the figures to see that they were almost at the steps.

Sjin shot one, last frightened glance at Lalna, before hurrying inside the factory.

Lalna turned, balling his fists at his sides, to see Rythian and Zoey crossing the courtyard towards him. Zoey seemed pale and apprehensive, her white face even whiter against her flaming hair.

Rythian, on the other hand, wore an expression of sickening excitement. He strolled casually across the flagstones towards Lalna, his hands in his pockets.

'Greetings!' he called, stopping a few metres away. 'Fancy seeing you here, Lalna, my old friend!'

'What do you want?' Lalna snarled, his knuckles whitening.

'Just came to,' - Rythian smiled nastily - 'catch up with a few people.'

'Leave,' Lalna said, his voice rising. 'You have no business here.'

The smile left Rhythian's face in an instant.

'I think you'll find that I do have business here, _Lalna_,' he said, hissing out the other's name like it was poison. 'I have business with you, in fact.'

Suddenly the katana was in his hand and he was sprinting towards the scientist, his face contorted with anger and excitement. Lalna threw himself sideways and Rythian barrelled past, wheeling around quickly to charge again.

Thrusting his hands into his pockets, Lalna ripped out a Splash Potion of Poison and hurled it at Rythian. The man staggered backwards, choking and coughing on the noxious gas that was filling his lungs. Lalna heard Zoey scream as Rythian clutched at his chest, gagging, and seized his chance. He lunged at Rythian, knocking him backwards, and fought to pin his arms to the floor - but Rythian was too strong. Despite the poison currently pumping through his bloodstream, his managed to throw Lalna off him and scramble to his feet. Lalna stumbled but managed to keep his footing as Rythian leapt on him, both of them fighting for control of the other.

'Rythian!'

Both turned at the sound of the voice, and Lalna's heart sank.

Sjin was standing a little way off, his mouth hanging open, clearly horrorstruck.

'Wh-what are you -' he began.

But at that very moment, Rythian slid his katana into Lalna's chest.

For a few seconds, Lalna didn't know what had happened. He tried to move his legs, but his body didn't seem to be working properly.

Then he saw the triumphant grin on Rythian's face, and looked down at the blade buried up to the hilt in his flesh.

His knees buckled, and he dropped awkwardly to the floor. Rythian pulled the katana free, twisting it slightly as Lalna hit the ground.

There was a strange roaring in his ears as he lay there, twisted into an uncomfortable shape, blood pooling around him and staining his coat. He couldn't feel the pain of the blade: only a dull, throbbing ache that was spreading across his body, making him feel strangely weak.

He could see the expression of mingled horror, fury and grief on Sjin's face as his friend charged towards Rythian, weaponless, both his fists raised. He barely registered when Rythian threw Sjin against the wall and slid the katana between his ribs; barely heard Sjin's gasp of pain as he slid down the wall into a heap at the bottom, his eyes wide and glazed, death seeping into his face.

When Rythian sank a foot into his side, Lalna let himself be rolled onto his back, watching silently as tears of anger welled in Zoey's eyes.

'You said you wouldn't kill them!' he heard through the roaring. 'You said you would leave them alive!'

'These things must be done,' Rythian said, and Lalna felt his ribs crack as the foot slammed into his side again.

The sunlight was reflecting off the piece of machinery he had been working on. He could just see the shape of the face; the distorted body that he had been moulding into shape over the past few month, spending hours carefully perfecting the eyes; the nose; the mouth. He had tried to keep it secret, saying it was a present for someone else.

But now the one who it had been made was dead, and Sjin would never know that Lalna hadn't been shunning him; that he had cared.

A single tear fell from Lalna's eye and slid down his cheek.

'Goodbye, Sjin,' he whispered as the last of his strength left him, and the sun disappeared behind the distant horizon.


End file.
